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the New Empire for the two others. The key to the real chronology was perhaps originally preserved in chronological and historical works, which in the lower ages of the New Empire were either lost or forgotten. It is however certain that in Manetho's Lists, joint reigns are nowhere indicated; yet the monuments prove them to have been frequent in the Old Empire (for example in the 12th Dynasty).

It would certainly be somewhat surprising had Manetho given such a statement of the sums total of all the years of reign in the case of any family of the New Empire. As Lists of Kings of the two preceding periods were in existence at its commencement, it must also have possessed historical registers. Civilisation and literature were never again interrupted in Egypt from that time to the fall of the Roman Empire, and Manetho lived in the flourishing age of the Ptolemies. But what authority have we for supposing that the Lists of the New Empire in their present form and with their present sums, are the work of Manetho? May they not be a digest of extracts from the historical work, or, as the form of the Lists is clearly according to primitive Egyptian practice, may they not have been enlarged, by interpolating the names of Kings (friends or foes who reigned contemporarily) out of the same work, and their chronology have thus been corrupted? Some light will be thrown upon the question in our inquiry concerning the Christian schools of Manethonian criticism; its complete settlement however can only be obtained through a careful analysis of the

monuments.

As regards the rule of succession in the New Empire, it may here be assumed, as demonstrated, that no two Dynasties, from the 18th to the 30th,88 were contemporary. This fact is admitted by all Egyptologers, an admission

83 The contemporaneity of the 25th and 26th in its commencement is asserted by some chronologers. [S. B.]

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very creditable to their love of truth, when we consider how perplexing they must have found the great extension of the period of the New Empire which resulted from it. That period we shall here but cursorily remark, comprised as nearly as possible 1300 years.

When however the Egyptologers of the school of Champollion, following the steps of their master, infer from this, that there were no contemporary reigns whatever in Manetho; and consequently that the Dynasties of the Middle Empire must be considered as consecutive, such conclusion is at least premature. Any inference drawn from the state of the New Empire as to other previous periods with which it had no sort of analogy were obviously as illogical, as if, after the loss of our history, some future German investigator should argue from the Lists of Dynasties of German Princes of the 19th century in Austria, Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, and Wurtemburg, that the "pretended" former Dynasties of Suabian, Frank, and Saxon kings, "of the Mythological time," either never existed at all, or, if they did, must of necessity have been contemporary. To this may be added that not one of them attempted, nor did any English critic, to arrange the chronology prior to the New Empire according to Manetho. But we prefer an appeal to himself. Syncellus has preserved for us his own statement as to the duration of the Empire, which he described in 30 Dynasties. This most remarkable passage, hitherto so strangely overlooked, runs as follows 89

"The period of the hundred and thirteen generations,90 described by Manetho in his three volumes, comprises a sum total of three thousand five hundred and fifty-five years."

This can only be borrowed from Manetho himself, for

89 Syncell. Chronog. p. 52. D. See the Appendix of Authorities, A. I.

90 Γενεαί.

it no way agrees with the canon or computations of Syncellus. Neither can there have been any mistake in the transcript; for he reckons the 3555 years, from "about the 15th" (it should be the 9th) year before Alexander, the year in which the younger Nectanebo died (mentioned by himself in this passage, as being the last King described by Manetho, the last Pharaoh of the Egyptian race)-(in Syncellus the 5147th year of the world)-up to the year of the world 1586 (it should be 1593). He then proceeds to base upon these data a calculation, to which we shall revert in our analysis of the Christian chronographers. As the 16th century of the world falls according to him, prior to the Flood, he calculates without hesitation how many of those 3555 years must be deducted "for the Time which was not," in order to obtain a dry foundation, for commencing his fabric of Egyptian Chronology, after the confusion of tongues with Mizraim, whom the Egyptians strangely enough called Menes. This silly calculation in itself no way concerns us. It acquires, however, the utmost importance, first, as a guarantee that the above chronological number is the result of no textual error. In the second place, it proves that number to have been neither invented by Syncellus, nor concocted in any other quarter to favour some particular system by tampering with the text of Manetho: for it does not tally with any system of the Christian fathers or chronologers. We may venture to assert, that the numbers of Manetho have been transmitted to us quite as correctly as those of the Canon of Ptolemy.

It may therefore be held as established, that Manetho assigned to the Egyptian Empire, from Menes to the death of the younger Nectanebo, a period of

"Three thousand five hundred and fifty-five years." Syncellus may have found this notice in a section of the Epitome of Africanus, the rest of which he did not

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copy-for we know Africanus only through him. Perhaps he found the statement in but one of the editions or transcripts of the Lists of Manetho, which he mentions as having collated. He may even have had Manetho's historical work, either a part or the whole of it before him, just as easily as he could the List of Kings of Eratosthenes, which his predecessors had neglected.

We have, therefore, on the same authority, in the sum total of all the Dynasties of Manetho, from 1500 to 2000 years more than Manetho himself assigned as the duration of the Egyptian history within the 30 Dynasties. Consequently the summing up of the Dynasties is not the work of Manetho.

This main point being settled, the question forces itself upon us, what Dynasties composed the historical series for the Chronology? Which of them were cotemporaneous? Manetho must have stated this in his historical work. The answer to these questions, as already seen, may perhaps be found in the Turin Papyrus; and to the following effect-the duration of the Old and Middle Empires is 3555 years according to Manetho, minus the 1300 years (nearly), which he assigned to the New Empire (Dynasties 18-30)-in round numbers about 2250. But how is this number to be reconciled with those of the individual Dynasties? Moreover, are we sure that Manetho's dates, for the duration of the Empire from Menes to the expulsion of the Shepherd Kings from Memphis, was given on sufficient authority? The monuments may prove to us that the earlier Dynasties contained historical Kings-and it is admitted to be proved for the 4th Dynasty-but the monuments can neither give, nor make up for, the want of a Chronology when it no longer exists.

Is it possible to find this chronological key in the researches of the Alexandrian critics? They were the fathers of the Old Chronology-the Ptolemies were

their patrons-the Egyptian archives were open to them. They had therefore great advantages over Manetho in both respects. The extent and superiority of their intellectual powers, their acquaintance with the chronological researches of other great nations, and their extensive general learning, together with the previous work of such men as Manetho, must have more than compensated for their total or comparative ignorance of the language and ancient literature of Egypt. Alexandria itself must have been full of learned Egyptian Pundits or Sacred Scribes, and Dicæarchus, Eratosthenes and Apollodorus were no Wilfords. They were even, comparatively, far more learned than the otherwise highly estimable Presidents of the Oriental Society, Sir William Jones and Colebrooke.

It is impossible that Grecian men of letters, some of them of the school of Aristotle, critics and commentators, whose ingenuity has never been surpassed, could be deceived or satisfied with the Egyptian method of computation.

But did they institute researches into the Old Egyptian Chronology, and are their labours preserved to us? On the latter point at least, considerable doubts may be entertained. For not only did Diodorus learn little or nothing from them, but modern investigators, far superior to the uncritical Sicilian, seem to have been so certain of not finding anything there, that they have never even sought for it. Perhaps however the fact may be the very reverse.

Before passing on to the Greeks, a few remarks must be devoted to the other Egyptian chronologers or historians mentioned by the ancients.

VII. THE SUCCESSORS OF MANETHO - PTOLEMY, APION, CHÆREMON,

HERAISKUS.

MANETHO'S excellence as an historian is reflected in the clearest light through the monuments which are now

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